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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29298189">Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/space_pilot3000/pseuds/space_pilot3000'>space_pilot3000</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Warriors - Erin Hunter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Western, Drinking, M/M, also very very liable to be abandoned, medical distress, tags liable to change as i literally haven't written part two yet so idk what'll be in it</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:01:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,988</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29298189</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/space_pilot3000/pseuds/space_pilot3000</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sheriff Rusty Collins of White Hills, New Mexico thinks he's finally outrun his past as the gunslinging legend "Wildfire" - until one day, a member of his old enemy's posse comes stumbling into town, forcing Rusty to confront his past and rethink his future.</p><p>This work was written for Akitsune-Lune's WAUrriors FebrAUry event!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Firestar/Longtail (Warriors)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>WAUrriors FebrAUry</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I feel like it should be pretty obvious who's who in this one, so no key this time :)</p><p>My research for this was incredibly tenuous, but all the stuff about treating rattlesnake bites is REAL. Apparently multiple people not only survived those treatments but were actually, for real cured by them? Insane. I recommend further googling on it tbh because some of the stories are wild.</p><p>
  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQOHaZpmM12LeRHG0hTutOXAskSRFICDM">Also, I did make a sad gay cowboy playlist to go with this fic.</a>
</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dust.</p><p>It was the most consistent thing about life in White Hills. Dust. It settled on the windows, on the furniture, and any water that was left still long enough. When it didn't settle, it lingered in the air, putting an orange-brown haze over the landscape.</p><p>White Hills was a young town, in the scheme of things. In a world where far-off castles in Europe had been standing for for eight centuries or more, it was hard to look at a town that had been around for only a few decades and declare it old. But most days, the town felt just as ancient as the dust it was built on. Years of sandstorms and desert sun always made a place - or a body - look older than its age.</p><p>In all this dust stood the town’s sheriff.</p><p>Rusty typically arrived at the sheriff’s office at nine in the morning and, after checking to ensure everything was how he’d left it, he sat in a weathered rocking chair on the covered porch of the office and read. Today was no different. Not three days ago, the postman had come in from Santa Fe and brought him a couple new books and even a shiny-papered magazine to go through, and Rusty had paid him handsomely for the trouble.</p><p>His deputy, Gray, came out to join him, carrying a long gnarled stick, a whittling knife, and a Coca-Cola. Just as Rusty shelled out his pay to keep himself in new reading material, Gray practically bribed the postman to bring him a few new bottles of Coke with every visit. He usually went through them in less than a week, and was left wanting for the better part of a fortnight until the postman got it in him to visit again.</p><p>“Huh,” Gray said.</p><p>Rusty, who was trying very hard to get through the introduction to his book with his third-grade literacy, simply replied, “What’s that?”</p><p>“I’ll be damned if there isn’t a man on the horizon,” Gray said.</p><p>That got the sheriff’s attention.</p><p>“A <em>man</em>?” he said, standing up to look. No one ever walked into White Hills. There was nowhere close enough to walk from without getting heatstroke. But sure enough, there was a dark shape on the horizon.</p><p>They stood at the edge of the porch, hands on the railing. Book, Coke, and whittling were all forgotten in favor of this new mystery. It was slow going for the man on the horizon, who seemed to be limping.</p><p>“Should I hop on a horse and go fetch him?” Gray said uncertainly.</p><p>“I wouldn’t,” Rusty said. “You can never be too sure with folks. ‘Specially strangers.” He knew from experience what his deputy didn’t - most outlaws weren’t above faking an injury when they thought it might do them some good.</p><p>They watched the man another twenty minutes before he stumbled into the far end of town and, with a quick glance around, collapsed facedown in the dirt. Gray didn’t hesitate a second before he vaulted over the porch railing and started running over.</p><p>“Oh, damn it all,” Rusty muttered. He put on his hat and followed.</p><p>By the time he had reached the man, Gray was already shaking him. The deputy glanced up at him with a worried look. “Lost consciousness,” Gray said. “And he’s hot as hell. Must have been wandering through the desert for a while now.” Before Rusty could reply, the deputy rolled the man over with a heave.</p><p>Rusty stopped short, not completely sure of what he was seeing.</p><p>The stranger’s long, thin face was covered in dirt and dried blood and scraggly, unshaven hair, but beneath it all he wasn’t much of a stranger at all. Rusty knew this man, as much as you could ever know someone who was always on the other side of a gun from you.</p><p>“Snake Eyes,” he said aloud.</p><p>“’Scuse me, Sheriff?” Gray said, pausing.</p><p>Rusty shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. “I knew this fellow,” he said hesitantly. “Knew him from my… from my Wildfire days. He was in with the Tiger’s gang.”</p><p>That was all it took for the deputy’s eyes to widen. “He’s an outlaw?”</p><p>Was he? Was he still an outlaw? It had been three years since Rusty had left his own gunslinging days behind him. He’d never known what had happened to Snake Eyes and Smokes, the Tiger’s right and left hand men. Had they put their own adventures aside in favor of a better lifestyle, like Rusty had? He wanted to believe they had.</p><p>But there was a feeling in his gut that they hadn't. You could never be too sure with folks.</p><p>Gray had already moved on from his own question. He was hefting Snake Eyes’ arm around his shoulders and digging his feet into the ground. “Help me get him up,” he said to Rusty.</p><p>“What are you doing?” the sheriff said.</p><p>“Well, we’ve got to get him out of the sun.”</p><p>Conviction surged in Rusty’s chest. “We can’t just bring this man into White Hills,” he said sharply. “He's an outlaw. We help him, we could be putting the whole damn town in danger.”</p><p>“Come off it, Sheriff,” Gray said. “Look at him. He needs help.”</p><p>Rusty glanced at the man’s face again. It was slack and red, probably burnt from hours in the sun even though he was wearing a hat. He had to concede that the man looked sick - very sick. If he didn't see a doctor, he might even die.</p><p>“Fine,” he conceded with a sigh. “Let’s get him to Cindy.”</p><p>—</p><p>The good doctor Lucinda Macon was short and intimidating. She usually wore a mauve shirtwaist and a cotton skirt, and her hair was roughly the color and texture of the dust bunnies that collected under every bed in the county.</p><p>Technically speaking she was no real doctor at all, on account of having been born in in the body of a black woman - but as she had once assured Rusty, her lack of degree did not make her a quack. She had spent her childhood following her father around his office as he set broken bones, bandaged wounds, and bled humors. He himself had had an apprenticeship with a Civil War doctor as a young man. But to make sure her knowledge wasn’t outdated, Lucinda regularly rode to Santa Fe to order the latest medical journals - she wasn’t willing to rely on the postman to remember their names.</p><p>When Rusty and Gray pulled the outlaw into her office behind the saloon, she was on them in an instant, heaving the man away from them and setting him in a cot.</p><p>“What’s wrong with him?” she said.</p><p>“Good mornin’ to you too, Lucinda,” Gray said.</p><p>“He was walking through the desert,” Rusty said. “That’s all we know, but at the very least, I think he's sunburnt.”</p><p>Cindy nodded briskly. “Gray, would you fetch us some water from the bar?”</p><p>“He can have my Coke,” Gray said, holding up the bottle.</p><p>“Christ, I thought I told you to stop drinking that crap,” Cindy said. “It’s addictive.”</p><p>Gray shrugged and set the Coke down on her desk, then left the room. Rusty stood awkwardly, hands in pockets, as the doctor crossed over to Snake Eyes and took off his hat, then his bandanna and his boots. When she started to loosen the man’s shirt, Rusty coughed.</p><p>“Woah, there, ma’am. Keep your dignity,” he said uncomfortably.</p><p>She gave him a sharp look. “I’d rather keep my dignity as a doctor and save this patient than keep my dignity as a lady and let him die.” With that, she pulled the shirt off entirely, revealing a lean, scarred torso with a thin, wispy covering of salt-and-pepper hair. Rusty looked away, embarrassed and not quite sure why.</p><p>Gray came back in that minute with a basin of water and two empty cups, which he delivered to the side of the cot. Cindy took both cups, filled them, and poured them over the unconscious man’s chest, soaking the cot and the floor beneath.</p><p>“What’s that for?” Rusty said.</p><p>“It’ll cool him off,” she said. “Get his core body temperature down. Plus, might wake him up enough for him to drink…” They all waited a second, but the man in the cot did not stir. Cindy shrugged. “Well, while that water cools him, I’ll get started on…” She took a handkerchief from her pocket and wet it, then kneeled down and started to wipe the dirt and blood from the man’s face.</p><p>Gray turned to Rusty. “See, that wasn’t so bad,” he said, picking up his Coke from the desk and popping it open.</p><p>Rusty shook his head slowly. “Wasn’t that part I was worried about,” he said. “I’m wondering what he’s going to do once he wakes up. I’ve seen him kill people, Deputy.”</p><p>The deputy’s eyes softened. “I didn’t know it was as bad as all that.”</p><p>“What else would it have been?” Rusty said.</p><p>Gray shrugged wildly. “I don’t know. You don’t tell us <em>anything</em> about your Wildfire days.”</p><p>“It's true, you don’t,” Cindy said from her place at the side of the cot.</p><p>“Don’t you gang up on me,” Rusty muttered.</p><p>“For all I knew,” Gray continued, “he was just a bank robber, or committed fraud or something. Or I guess what I <em>really</em> figured was the Tiger and his gang were cattle rustlers, you know, petty thieves - and you were a cowboy.”</p><p>Rusty sighed. “I can’t blame you for not knowing when I’m the one that never told you,” he said. “But I’m not exaggerating when I say this man is bad news.”</p><p>“I understand, Sheriff,” Gray said gently. “Listen. We did the right thing, bringing him to the doctor. But when he’s all fixed up, we’ll run him out of town, all right? That’s a promise.”</p><p>“Shhh,” Cindy said, jumping up excitedly. “He’s waking.”</p><p>She filled another cup with water, and just then, the man on the cot burst into a loud coughing fit, his eyes still closed. </p><p>“Wh-where am I?” he managed. “And where did all my clothes go?”</p><p>“White Hills,” Cindy said. “New Mexico. I’m the doctor. I’m treating you.” She handed him the cup, then re-wet her handkerchief and started to clean the dirt from his torso.</p><p>“I can't see,” he said.</p><p>Cindy looked alarmed. “You bump your head?” she said. The man ignored her, struggling to push himself up onto his elbows. </p><p>“What day is it?” the man rasped, sounding utterly lost.</p><p>“April 26,” Rusty said tentatively.</p><p>At the sound of the sheriff’s voice, the man fell silent. Rusty noted uncomfortably that the man had a sudden white-knuckled grip on the side of the cot.</p><p>“1892,” Gray added unhelpfully.</p><p>“Wildfire, that you?” the man in the cot coughed. Then he coughed again, and burst into a hacking coughing fit.</p><p>“Sure,” Rusty said. Something about the way the other man said the nickname made him angry. “And you’re Snake Eyes. So listen here - I don’t know why you’ve come into my town, but you’re not putting it in any danger under my watch. Understand?”</p><p>The man’s coughing fit was slowly starting to sound more like laughter. It died down, and the man fell back in his cot. “Sure,” he said. “If that’s how you want things to be. Sounds like you’ve gone soft, Wildfire.”</p><p>“Don’t call me that,” Rusty said sharply.</p><p>“What the hell am I supposed to call you?”</p><p>Rusty hesitated. “Russel Collins,” he said slowly. “<em>Sheriff</em> Russel Collins, to be clear. But most folks around here call me Rusty.”</p><p>“Sheriff.” The man on the cot said the word like it was a fine whiskey he was trying to savor. “You have gone soft.” He stuck his hand out in a random direction like he was going for a handshake, nearly smacking Cindy in the face. “I’m Ezra Long.”</p><p>Rusty stepped over and took the man’s hand, shaking it uncertainly.</p><p>“Well, if your little macho showdown is over now,” Cindy said, “I have to ask you, Mr. Long - what  happened to get you in such a state as to be dragged into my office?”</p><p>“Rattlesnake bite,” Ezra said.</p><p>“<em>What</em>?” Cindy shrieked. “Where?”</p><p>Ezra pointed to a spot on his calf.</p><p>The doctor barely looked before she flew across the room and flung upon a drawer of her desk, rifling through different curatives and medicines. “When?” she demanded.</p><p>“Last night,” Ezra rasped. “While I was camping in the desert. I killed it pretty quick, not that that helped. Don’t remember much after that. Just knew I had to get to the nearest town or I’d die.”</p><p>“It's a miracle you haven't already,” Cindy said. She pulled a bottle of ammonia out of the drawer and slammed it down on the desk, then kept rifling. “And it’s no wonder you can’t see.”</p><p>“Don’t suppose my horse followed me back,” Ezra said, sounding as though he hadn't much hope.</p><p>“Not as far as we can tell,” Gray said.</p><p>Rusty jumped; he had nearly forgotten the deputy was in the room, such was his uncharacteristic quiet. He took Gray by the shoulder and started walking him towards the door. “Listen, Deputy. You’d better get back to the sheriff’s office,” he said. “Someone needs to keep an eye on this town.” He hoped Gray would get his implicit meaning: that while he didn’t want to leave the town alone, he also didn’t want to leave the outlaw alone with Lucinda.</p><p>Whether or not he understood, Gray nodded and took off.</p><p>Cindy, by now, had pulled a small bottle of mustard out of the desk drawer as well and was back by the cot, squirting the mustard onto her handkerchief. “This is going to hurt quite a bit,” she warned. “Take this and hold it under your nose. Try to concentrate on the smell - it’ll stimulate your nervous system and keep it running. Now, pull up your pant and show me the bite.”</p><p>Rusty, who had pulled Cindy’s chair away from the desk and was settled in the corner, couldn’t help but wince sympathetically when he saw the angry red bite. A nervous, writhing energy was building up just under his skin. He hated watching the doctor work. But he couldn’t leave her alone with Snake Eyes.</p><p>“Are you ready?” Cindy said, standing firm. Ezra nodded. Rusty wondered whether he would have if he could have seen what she was holding.</p><p>She uncorked the bottle of ammonia and overturned it, and Ezra’s scream rattled the wooden walls.</p><p>Rusty didn’t last long before fleeing out into the saloon proper to get a stiff drink. If nothing else, the smell of ammonia was making him dizzy - but that wasn't just it. He soothed his guilt at leaving Cindy alone with the outlaw by reminding himself of the size of the bite on Ezra’s leg. The man simply wouldn’t be capable of attacking anyone right then.</p><p>By the time Cindy joined him, the sky outside was turning pink. She flipped her skirt over the barstool and sat down, then ordered a drink of her own.</p><p>“He all right?” Rusty said, at once concerned and not sure why he was.</p><p>“As all right as he can be,” she said grimly. “The wound’s bandaged, and the ammonia’s gone after the poison. I had him swallowing mustard and vinegar for as long as I could to keep him going, but he’s resting now. If we’re lucky, he’ll wake up.”</p><p>“That doesn’t sound very all right,” Rusty said.</p><p>She sighed. The bartender delivered her drink, and she thanked him as she picked it up. She swirled the amber liquid around glass without drinking. “It's not as bad as all that,” she said. “If he survived walking for hours with no treatment, he’ll pull through this too. The question is, what are we going to do with him afterwards?”</p><p>“You mean he can’t stay in your office?”</p><p>Cindy shook her head. “He won’t do well in that cot. He needs real rest to heal, in a real bed. And while I may not normally be worried about my dignity as a lady, I have no interest in bringing an outlaw into my home.”</p><p>“And you think I do?”</p><p>“Well, I know that you don’t mind camping when you have to,” she said with a shrug.</p><p>Rusty chuckled. He finished off his whiskey and stood up. “All right. Let’s go get him.”</p><p>Between the pair of them, they managed to get Ezra back to the Rusty’s house and settled in his bed. It was strange, Rusty thought, to see another man nestled up between his quilts. It was especially strange to see Snake Eyes there, and especially when the outlaw looked so peaceful and sweet lying there.</p><p>Cindy gave him her whole bottle of mustard and told him to make sure Ezra ate the rest of it when he woke, and to try and keep his wound clean, and that she would be back tomorrow around noon for a house call. Then she was gone, and Rusty was alone in the little one-room cabin with the accomplice of his longest and bitterest enemy.</p><p>He took the extra pillow from the bed and laid it on the ground, over the hand-knotted rug. He had nothing to use as a blanket; he only owned the one quilt, and wasn't cold-hearted enough to take it from a sick man, whatever that man had done. </p><p>Rusty looked down at the rug, which suddenly looked very thin on the wooden floor; he looked up at the bed.</p><p>Well, he already had the bastard sleeping in his house. What was one more thing? He changed into some sleeping clothes and climbed into bed, terribly aware of the warm presence at the other side and of how vulnerable he was making himself, and trying not to think of how little he really minded it.</p>
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